Costa Rica adopts electric transport law to reduce emissions

Costa Rica adopted a new law Thursday to incentivize electric transport with a long-term view to eliminating hydrocarbon-powered vehicles in the country, responsible for most of Costa Rica’s greenhouses gas emissions.

The initiative eliminates sales, customs and circulation taxes for electric vehicles and allows them to use municipal parking facilities free of charge.

“This law will make it possible to transform Costa Rica’s vehicle fleet in just a few years, from cars, cargo vehicles, trains and buses, replacing them with 100 percent electric vehicles,” said President Luis Guillermo Solís when he signed the law at the headquarters of the Costa Rican Electricity Institute (ICE).

He added, “Costa Rica has all the conditions to spearhead this effort, unprecedented in Latin America.”

Environment Minister Edgar Gutierrez noted at the ceremony that the country’s percentage of renewable energy generation has approached 100 in recent years, reducing carbon dioxide emissions that cause global warming.

“Costa Rica has a great opportunity to electrify its transport, because we have available a low-emissions electrical supply and a coverage level that allows a vehicle to be charged almost anywhere in the country,” he said.

To date, Costa Rica has 20 electric vehicle charging stations, and the government plans to install another 41 stations this year.

Electric transport is one of the actions Costa Rica has pursued in order to reach its stated goal of carbon neutrality by the year 2021.